


What the Butterflies Said

by AtypicalOwl



Series: The Butterflies!Verse [2]
Category: Young Wizards - Diane Duane
Genre: Feels, Fluff, Gen, Offscreen character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-01
Updated: 2014-12-01
Packaged: 2018-02-27 15:33:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2698055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AtypicalOwl/pseuds/AtypicalOwl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"A kid that age, she can talk about magic and spells and what the butterflies said to her that morning, and her parents won't bat an eye."</p><p>-Tom Swale, <i>Only a Mere Florist</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	What the Butterflies Said

Maggie Reynolds didn’t look too closely at the box of kid’s books she picked up for a dollar from the library sale. There were some favorites from her own childhood, like _The Monster at the End of This Book_ , and a few she didn’t recognize but flipped through briefly and thought were cute. If she had paid more attention, she might have noticed the odd book out. But she hadn’t, and she didn’t, and the books found their way onto Sadie’s bedroom shelf where they were promptly forgotten until Sadie was old enough to read.

Sadie took to reading with a passion that surprised her parents, devouring Dr. Seuss books at a ferocious pace. Maggie and Daniel pulled out the old library books sooner than they thought, letting Sadie sound out the words and helping her along where she needed it. They were thrilled she loved reading so much, and that she was learning so quickly.

Sadie herself just thought it was fascinating that these little scribbly black things printed on the flat things with pictures could convey so much information if you knew the secrets to them. Finishing a new book was a triumph, that wonderful feeling of “ha! I figured this one out!” Sadie thought that all the problems that made her parents frown when they watched the news could be solved if every person just read every book. Why could there be frowning people in the world when wonders like _One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish_ and _But No Elephants!_ existed?

Her parents discussed getting her a library card far sooner than they had anticipated, and didn’t realize that Sadie was listening in. Poor Maggie and Daniel did their best to keep straight faces as Sadie gave them a petulant toddler-lecture about how she didn’t need a ‘lie-berry’ card because it’s bad to lie and you shouldn’t give a card to dishonest fruit, and if they wanted to give her something, how about more books? Once they got things cleared up, though, Sadie was delighted by the thought of a building full of books that would let you borrow as many as you wanted for free.

A weekly trip to the library just wasn’t enough for Sadie, and after she finished all of the books she had checked out, she would gravitate back towards her bookshelf, pulling out old favorites and looking for books she hadn’t already read a dozen times. She didn’t even need to sound out the titles by now; she was four years old, which was, as far as she was concerned, far too old for such childish crutches.

Maggie was happy with Sadie’s reading habits because she could trust her daughter to just sit on the beanbag chair in her reading nook for hours without a peep, while she got caught up on cooking or cleaning or laundry or the occasional guilty pleasure TV show. In fact, she was indulging in the latter when Sadie hollered for her one lazy summer afternoon.

“Mommy!” Sadie yelled, “I need help!”

“What is it, sweetie?” Maggie replied, trying to disentangle herself from the cat that didn’t want to leave her comfortable lap.

“I don’t know what to do! I want to be a wizard, but this book says it’s scary!”

Sadie’s statement didn’t make a whole lot of sense, but then again, she was four years old. Only adults tended to be overly concerned with things like “making sense”.

“Coming, I just have to move Barty!” Maggie called.

“Silly kitty!” Sadie giggled.

Bartholomeow (oh hush, her husband named him) finally deigned to remove his claws from Maggie’s lap and she made her way to Sadie’s room. Sadie was sitting on the floor next to her beanbag chair, clutching a book to her chest and looking like she might cry.

“Can I see?” Maggie asked.

Sadie nodded, handed her the book, and scooted to the side to make room. Maggie sat down on the beanbag chair and Sadie climbed into her lap.

Maggie paused before opening the book, confused. “I don’t remember seeing this before. Where did you find this?”

“On my bookshelf! It was behind other books!” Sadie replied.

“Ah, I see.” Maggie looked at the cover. It was a thin, hard-bound book with a plain blue cover and the title _How to be a Wizard_ in shiny gold lettering. “Oh, this must be from the library sale. I don’t think I’ve read this one before.”

“It’s good, I guess, but I don’t like the ending.”

“Do you mind if I read it?”

“Would you read it to me?” Sadie turned her biggest puppy dog eyes on her mom, but she needn’t have bothered, because Maggie loved it when Sadie asked her to read out loud.

“Of course!”

Maggie opened the book and flipped past the title pages to where the story began. “Once upon a time, there was a young girl named Natalie. She loved talking to the birds and trees and fish. One day, she found a book that taught her how to hear what the trees said back…”

Maggie thought it was a cute story. With the book’s help, Natalie learned how to use magic and became a wizard, which seemed to be more about talking to things than shouting magic words and casting spells. Natalie met another boy, Kyle, who turned out to be a new wizard too. Then a shadow monster attacked their magical kingdom, and they had to work together to stop it. Their spells weren't enough alone, so they saved their kingdom by talking a dragon into breathing fire near the shadow and making it too bright for the darkness to move.

She thought it had a good lesson: it's okay to talk about your problems and you shouldn't be afraid to ask for help. All in all, it was pretty good as kid’s books go.

“What didn’t you like about the ending?” she asked Sadie. Natalie and Kyle had defeated the shadow and lived happily ever after, just like in any other kid’s book.

“You didn’t get to that part yet,” Sadie said.

Maggie frowned, and looked at the book again. Sure enough, there was another few pages after the one that said “The End”. She read it out loud. “On the next page is the same Wizard’s Oath Natalie and Kyle took. If you read it out loud, you can be a wizard too! But just like them, you’ll have to go through a test before you’re a full wizard. There’s a problem out there that only you can solve. It will be hard, and it might be scary, so you have to be brave. But if you try, you can make the world a better place like Natalie and Kyle.”

Sadie scrunched up her face, turned in Maggie’s lap, and hugged her tight.

“What’s the matter?” Maggie asked, setting the book down and wrapping her arms around Sadie.

“I don’t know if I can be a wizard,” she mumbled into Maggie’s shirt. “I’m not brave enough to fight a shadow monster.”

“Well, Natalie and Kyle were scared too, but they did fine,” Maggie said. “It sounds like being a wizard is about being a good person. Sometimes it’s hard, and sometimes it’s scary, but if you’re kind, and you listen, and you try to help, you’ll be okay.”

Sadie sniffled, but nodded.

“Anyway, you don’t have to worry about shadow monsters. You have a nightlight!”

That made Sadie giggle. “Thanks, mommy.”

“You’re welcome, sweetie.”

Sadie finally let go of Maggie’s shirt and turned back around to look at the book.

“Do you want to read it out loud to me?” Maggie asked. “If any shadow monsters show up, I know where the flashlight is.”

Sadie giggled again. “Mommy, the shadow monster didn’t show up until later!” She turned the page to the Wizard’s Oath, a simple block of text that was unillustrated, unlike the rest of the book.

Sadie read it to herself before she started reading it out loud. Maggie let her take her time. It only took a few minutes before Sadie was ready.

“ _One, two,_

_three, four,_

_I declare_

_Eternal war_

 

_Five, six,_

_Seven, eight,_

_In Life’s name_

_And for Life’s sake_

 

_Nine, ten,_

_Eleven, twelve,_

_Against Death Itself,_

_He who fell  
_

 

_Twelve, eleven,_

_Ten, nine,_

_From now until_

_The end of Time_

 

_Eight, seven,_

_Six, five,_

_Fear for courage,_

_Death for Life_

_Four, three,_

_Two, one,_

_We will see_

_His work undone”_

 

Sadie’s words echoed a bit oddly in her suddenly quiet room.

Maggie blinked. “Well, that’s certainly different than the rhymes I had when I was your age. What do you think, Sadie? Do you feel better now?”

“Yeah,” Sadie said. “That wasn’t as scary as I thought it was going to be.” She climbed out of her mom’s lap and carefully put the book back on the shelf. “Can I read for a while more?”

“Yes, of course!” Maggie leaned over and gave Sadie a kiss on the forehead, then stood up, knees creaking a little. Oh, for the days when she was young and could sit for hours without getting sore! “I’ll be making dinner soon; it’ll probably be ready in an hour.”

“Okay Mommy!”

Maggie left Sadie’s room to go start the vegetables for dinner, as promised. She didn’t see Sadie take the wizard book from the bookshelf and open it again, and she definitely didn’t see the extra page that had appeared behind the one that held the Wizard’s Oath.

 _“Good job!”_ It read. _“If you’re reading this, you’ve taken the first step to becoming a wizard!”_

Sadie snuggled into her beanbag chair and turned the page.

 

~~~~~

 

A few nights after Sadie and Maggie read the wizard book, Maggie came into the living room to find Sadie sprawled on the floor on her stomach, nose to nose with Bartholomeow. She thought to intervene, because the cranky old cat wasn’t always fond of Sadie (and having a four-year-old right in his face wasn’t likely to improve his mood). He had never scratched her on purpose, but he had growled at her a few times and tended to flee when she entered the room.

Right now, though, Bartholomeow was relaxed and purring, and Sadie was keeping her hands to herself and not trying to pet him. In fact, they looked almost like they were having a conversation, Sadie speaking in hushed tones, and Barty “replying” with little meows and chirps.

Smiling, Maggie grabbed her phone, turned the flash off, took a picture, and texted it to Daniel with the caption “ _Your cat is getting along with our daughter. Watch out for flying pigs on the way home.”_

A minute later, he replied “ _too late do u kno if our insurance covers collision w/ avian swine?”_

 

_~~~~~_

 

“Hey Mags, I’m a little worried about Sadie,” Daniel said, lounging on the couch with the cat while Sadie was playing at a friend’s house. “I asked her if she wanted to go to the library tomorrow and she said no. She’s never said no before!”

Maggie chuckled. Her husband looked as worried as if Sadie was deathly ill. “Oh, it’s this book she found about magic and wizards. She’s really fallen in love with it; she rereads it all the time.”

Daniel wasn’t convinced, and he fiddled with Bartholomeow’s tail nervously. Barty growled at him and he stopped. “But it’s _Sadie_ and she said _no_ to _books_.”

“Dan, she’s just going through a phase. I mean, she asked me to help her make a magic wand like the one the kids in the book have. It just _had_ to be oak, like Natalie’s.” Maggie snickered. “She dragged me to the park and insisted on politely asking the tree if she could have one of the branches that fell during that wind storm.”

That got a laugh from Daniel. ”She’s going to be the most polite magician ever.”

“Wizard.”

“What?”

“I guess the book calls them wizards, even if they’re girls. Sadie is very insistent about it.”

“Huh.” Daniel scratched Barty behind the ears. “I guess I’m not one to talk. I seem to recall having a particular affinity for dinosaurs at that age.”

“Daniel Louis Jackson Reynolds, you _still_ have an affinity for dinosaurs. There is a triceratops on the television, for crying out loud.”

“Uh, I just keep that there in case one of the boys from Sadie’s school comes over to play!”

Maggie shared a skeptical look with the plastic toy in question. “Sure hon, whatever you say.”

 

~~~~~

 

“Mommy? Can we plant more flowers in the garden?” Sadie asked one day.

“Sure sweetie,” Maggie replied, and the next time they went shopping, she let Sadie pick out the best, brightest blooms.

“Why did you want more flowers?” Maggie asked later, while Sadie helped her plant them.

“The butterflies wanted more,” Sadie said. “They asked me to ask you for more.”

“Well, I hope the butterflies like these ones,” Mom said, patting the earth down around a patch of petunias.

There was a flash as iridescent wings reflected sunlight, and a beautiful blue butterfly swooped between them. Sadie giggled, and said “Okay, I’ll tell her.” She turned to her mom. “They like them, and say thanks.”

“You’re welcome, butterflies,” Maggie said. There did seem to be more of them flitting around the garden than there were last year. “Is there anything else they’d like?”

Sadie thought for a moment, a look of deep concentration crossing her face. It was adorable. “I think that’s all the butterflies wanted, but the birds want more water in the birdbath.”

Maggie looked over at the stone birdbath - sure enough, the water was low. “Now how did you see that when it’s taller than you are?” she asked.

Sadie shrugged. “I told you, they asked me to ask you.”

Maggie smiled. Sometimes, there was just no understanding what went through a kid’s head. “Okay, I’ll go get the bucket. Do you want to help me with the hose?”

“Yes, and the birds say thanks!”

 

~~~~~

 

“Daniel?”

“Yes, hon?”

“Sadie’s babysitter just called.”

“Is she okay?”

“Sadie’s fine, Joan is a bit hysterical.”

“What happened?”

“Sadie fell pretty bad on the playground.”

“… I thought you said she was okay.”

“Yes, Sadie’s fine, but… Well, I don’t know what to make of it. Joan says another kid shoved her on top of the tall slide, and she fell over the side.”

“Wait, the tall slide at Evergreen Park? How is she fine after falling off that?”

“Well, that’s what has Joan freaked out. She says Sadie fell in slow motion and landed on her feet, and didn’t even cry.”

“That’s weird.”

“Yeah.”

“Want to go home and make sure she’s okay?”

“Joan or Sadie?”

“Yes.”

 

~~~~~

 

The next time Daniel took Sadie to the library, she immediately picked out as many books she could find that had magic and wizards in them. She read them all at an alarming pace, finishing the first one before Daniel even parked the car in their driveway.

When Sadie had read them all, and was putting them back in her bookbag for another trip to the library, she had a big frown on her face.

“What’s the matter?” Daniel asked. “I thought you liked books with wizards.”

“They’re not the right _kind_ of wizards,” Sadie said sourly. “I wanted to find more books like my wizard book, but these wizards don’t talk to cats.”

“Uh, do you want books about people that talk to cats, then?” Daniel asked.

“No, I want more books with stories about _Wizards.”_ Daniel wasn’t sure how a petulant four-year-old could verbally capitalize a word, but she managed it.

“Well, we could see if the person who wrote your wizard book wrote any other books. Maybe he wrote more about Natalie and Kyle?”

“Okay, Daddy.”

Daniel smiled and ruffled Sadie’s hair. She glowered at him, which made him smile wider. “Go get your book and meet me in my office, okay?”

“Okay.” Sadie said.

By the time she had retrieved the book, Daniel had the library website open on his computer. “C’mere, Sadie,” he said, lifting her onto his lap so she could see the screen. “Let’s take a look.”

Sadie put the book on the desk in front of her, and set her “magic wand” next to it. It was just a twig that Maggie had helped her sand until it was smooth, but she carried it everywhere.

Daniel reached around Sadie and opened her wizard book to the title page, taking a moment to marvel that it was still in great condition. For such a young kid, Sadie took good care of her books, and that warmed his heart.

Under the title _How to be a Wizard_ , in surprisingly small print, was the name “Horace Hearnssen.” He pointed at it, and explained to Sadie that they were going to look Horace up on the library website to see what he had written. Sadie's eyes were wide and she watched with rapt attention.

Squinting at the tiny letters to make sure he had the spelling right, Daniel typed it in, hit Enter, and... “No results found.”

“Huh,” Daniel said. “I spelled it wrong?” He double checked, but it was accurate. “Well, maybe they just don’t have it at the library. Let’s look other places.”

Strangely, a Google search didn’t bring up any results for that name either. There were a couple of close matches, but they were all European lawyers and indie musicians, no authors.

Daniel flipped to where the copyright page should have been. Instead of information about the publisher and copyright dates and an ISBN, there was just a small note at the bottom of the page.

 

Printed 2014

Timeheart Small Press

 

“Huh.”

“Did you find it, Daddy?” Sadie asked.

“I don’t know yet.” He Googled “Timeheart Small Press”, but didn’t find any relevant results.

“Well Sadie, it looks like maybe someone printed this book themselves. I can’t find anything about the person who wrote it.”

“Oh.” Sadie sounded very disappointed.

“But, we can still try one more thing.”

“What’s that?”

“Well, you remember the nice librarian who helped you get your library card?”

Sadie nodded. “I liked her!”

“It’s her job to know all about books, so we can try asking her if she knows this book. And even if she doesn’t, she can probably help you find some wizard books that are closer to what you’re looking for.”

Sadie gave him a big kiss on the cheek and hopped off of Daniel’s lap. “Thanks, Daddy, you’re the best!”

It was only much later, as he was about to fall asleep, that Daniel thought to wonder about the fact that the book said it had been printed in 2014, when Maggie had supposedly gotten it from the library sale two years ago.

 

~~~~~

 

Sadie’s fifth birthday came, and all of Sadie’s playmates came over for a little party. Maggie and Daniel had spent a lot of time decorating and getting games set up, wanting everything to be perfect.

So when Sadie came wandering into the kitchen, looking sour, only half an hour into the party, Maggie was concerned. “Why the long face?”

“I don’t like them,” Sadie said.

“Who?”

“The other kids.”

“Aren’t they your friends?” Maggie asked. “Did something happen?”

“They wanted to look for Barty instead of playing hide-and-seek. He doesn’t like them. He thinks they’re too loud. So I said maybe we could read my wizard book, but they all think it’s stupid.”

“Well, why don’t I get the ‘pin the tail on the donkey’ out and they'll play that instead of bothering Barty?” Maggie offered.

Sadie sighed. “Okay Mommy.”

After a few rounds of ‘pin the tail’, Maggie called everyone into the dining room for cake and presents. Sadie sat at the head of the table, finally looking happier than she had been earlier.

The cake was decorated with flowers and had five candles on it, plus a sixth candle that was shaped like the numeral ‘5’. As Maggie carried it out of the kitchen, she started to sing. “Haaaaaaapy Birthday to-”

Someone had left a donkey tail on the floor, and Maggie slipped on it and lost her balance and went crashing down. “The cake!” a few of the kids cried.

Maggie watched, horrified, as the cake smashed into the carpet. She wasn’t worried about cleaning it up, she was worried about the lit candles! One of the flaming wicks touched the carpet, and she had a brief vision of the entire house burning down…

The kids were yelling, Daniel was yelling, and above it all, she heard Sadie’s voice, shouting something indistinct.

The candles went out, snuffed by the fall or the icing or the nonflammable carpet, Maggie wasn’t sure which.

She picked herself up off the floor and stared at the mess. The room went silent.

“Are you okay?” Daniel asked.

“Yeah, the cake’s not, though,” Maggie replied.

“Actually, I think it was a smashing success,” Daniel said.

Maggie covered her face in her hands. “Don’t,” she growled.

A child giggled.

“Aw, come on, I have to do something to lighten the gravity of the situation.”

That was definitely Sadie giggling.

“Your form could have been better, but you definitely stuck the landing.”

Maggie started laughing, and all the kids joined in. “You are terrible,” she said between guffaws. “Your puns are just the icing on the cake.”

Daniel stared at her for a long moment, then burst into laughter too.

Eventually, Maggie recovered enough to say, “Okay, who wants ice cream?”

 

~~~~~

 

Maggie woke up in the middle of the night to find Sadie crawling into bed with her and Daniel. “Are you okay, Sadie?” she whispered.

Sadie didn’t reply, and just fell into Maggie’s arms and whimpered.

“Did you have a bad dream?”

Sadie shook her head.

“What is it?”

Sadie trembled.

Daniel, bless him, had woken up too, and rolled over and hugged Sadie too, lending silent comfort.

Eventually, Sadie stopped shaking and pulled away. There were tears on her face.

“The stars are going out,” she whispered. “I’m scared.”

“What do you mean?” Daniel asked.

“I read it in the book. The stars are all going to go out.”

Maggie relaxed a bit. At least it wasn’t some clear and present threat making her daughter cry. Stars, she could handle.

“Was that the astronomy book Daddy got you from the library?”

“I don’t want the stars to die,” Sadie said.

Maggie and Daniel shared a look. This was A Talk that they knew they would have to have with Sadie eventually (especially since Bartholomeow was almost ten years old), but neither of them particularly wanted to do it at three in the morning on a weeknight.

“Sadie,” Daniel said, “everything dies someday, but the stars live for a really long time. Look at our sun, for example. Actually, don’t look at the sun, that’s bad for your eyes. Never look right at the sun, sweetie. It’ll burn them and then you won’t be able to see.”

“What Daddy was _trying_ to say before he got distracted,” Maggie said, fondly exasperated, “is that the sun is already billions of years old, and it’s definitely going to be around for another few billion years. Do you know how much a billion is?”

“More’n a million,” Sadie mumbled.

“That’s right. And there’s stars out there that are a lot bigger and older than the sun, and they are going to live even longer.”

“So,” Daniel said, “you don’t have to worry about the stars going out tonight, or tomorrow, or even when you’re as old as Mommy and Daddy.”

“But the book said…” Sadie sighed. “What if something was _making_ them go out? Faster than a billion years?”

Maggie patted Sadie’s hair fondly. “Sounds like you got one of your wizard books mixed up with your astronomy book. There’s nothing that can _make_ the stars go out, except a lot of time.”

“Besides, didn’t your wizards Natalie and Kyle take care of the shadow monsters that were eating all the light?” Daniel asked.

“I guess so… That’s what wizards are for,” Sadie said sleepily. “Can I stay in here tonight, though?”

“Of course, sweetheart.”

 

~~~~~

 

They were all curled up on the couch together (even Bartholomeow), watching _Toy Story_ on cable, and paying no attention to the commercial breaks, when a brief clip from the local news station played, advertising a story that would play later that night.

“Massive solar storms are expected sometime next week. How will this affect you? Find out at eleven.”

They would have ignored it, except Sadie whimpered, and curled into Maggie’s side, and didn’t look up when Buzz and Woody came back on the screen.

“I don’t want the sun to go out,” was all she would say when they asked her what was wrong.

Bartholomeow jumped down from where he was perched on the back of the sofa and leaned against Sadie, purring. She wrapped an arm around him and held him close, and he did not protest.

Somehow, that unnerved Maggie and Daniel even more than Sadie's reaction.

 

~~~~~

 

They took the astronomy book back to the library the next day, in the hopes that having it out of the house would help Sadie with her star fears.

Daniel helped Sadie pick out books about trees, electricity, and solving mysteries, because she said that “a wizard has to know about everything to be able to help everything!” He still wasn’t sure what to make of her “wizard phase”, but if it kept her interested in learning about other subjects too, he wasn’t about to complain.

“Hey Sadie, do you want to go to the park before we go home?” He asked. “We could get some ice cream and watch the geese.”

Sadie wrinkled her nose. “Geese are mean. They called me names last time and said they would chase me if I came back.”

That was the only thing Daniel found worrisome about the “wizard phase”: how insistent Sadie was that things like trees and butterflies and geese and Bartholomeow were talking to her. He hoped it was just a case of Sadie having an active imagination and an obsession with a book about wizards that talked to everything, and nothing that could indicate a more serious problem. Still, Sadie seemed shaky after worrying about the stars, so he hoped he could distract her a bit and bring her smile back.

Yeesh! When he was that age, he was worried about Charlie down the street stealing his dinosaur toys, not the lifespan of celestial objects. Sadie certainly took after Maggie more than him.

“Well, we don’t have to go near the water,” Daniel said. “I don’t blame you about not liking the geese. Did I ever tell you the story of how my uncle got chased by a goose on a golf course?”

“Yes Daddy,” Sadie said in a slightly exasperated tone. “That’s why I talked to them. I wanted to know why they’re so mean all the time.”

“And why are they so mean?”

“They just _are_. Like cats are soft and trees are tall. Geese are mean.” Sadie shivered. “I don’t like them. Their eyes look like shadow monsters.”

“Okay, no geese, then. But there’s no shadow monsters in ice cream, right?”

Sadie thought for a moment. “I think not as long as we get strawberry,” she said slowly.

“Isn’t strawberry your favorite?”

“Yeah!”

Daniel laughed.

 

~~~~~

 

With ice cream in one hand and his daughter’s free hand in the other, Daniel could forget his worries for a minute. The park was beautiful; the leaves on the trees were just starting to change color for fall, but the temperature hadn’t dropped far enough that it was uncomfortable to walk.

“Can we watch the squirrels?” Sadie asked.

“Sure.”

They found a nice little bench near the trees, and Sadie sat with her ice cream, enraptured by the little furry critters.

“So, geese are mean, but what are squirrels?” Daniel asked.

“They talk fast and they’re more worried about food than anything else.”

“Oh, like the little guy from _Ice Age?”_

“They think he’s an inaccurate and stereotypical portrayal.”

Daniel blinked. Those were unusually big words for Sadie. The books she was reading were really paying off.

“And they like pinecones better than acorns.”

“Ah,” was all Daniel could find to say to that.

They watched the squirrels for a minute, then Sadie said “Daddy, what does ‘stereotypical’ mean?”

Daniel opened his mouth to respond, but his cell phone rang. “Oh, that’s probably Mommy, wondering where we are.”

Sadie nodded and looked back to the squirrels.

Daniel answered the phone; it was indeed Maggie. “Hi Hon, we went to the park and got ice cream. Yeah, I thought it would be a good distraction. What was that? Why do we need pickles? What? Say that again?”

Maggie’s voice was drowned out by a burst of static. Daniel sighed - apparently the solar storms were finally affecting cell phones. “Hang on hon, I can’t hear you, it’s the solar flares. SOLAR. FLARES. Let me stand up and get a better signal. Hon? Hon?” He took a few steps towards the squirrels and held his phone up at arms length, trying to get more bars, but there was a soft _pop_ and the call dropped. “Well, that didn’t sound good. Hope my phone isn’t frying. Oh well, I _think_ she said to get pickles. Want to go to the store, Sadie?”

There was no response. Daniel turned around and looked at the bench. Sadie was gone, ice cream and book bag abandoned on the seat.

“Sadie?!” Daniel called. “Sadie, where did you go? Sadie!”

It wasn’t that big of a park, and he had only turned his back for a moment! “Sadie! Sadie!” How far could one little girl have gone in the time it took to say ‘solar flares and pickles’?

“Sadie, where are you?”

After looking for Sadie for a quarter of an hour, Daniel asked some of the other people at the park to help him find her, but another quarter of an hour passed and she was still nowhere to be found. It took almost that long to get Maggie back on the phone; he just couldn’t seem to get a signal. Another fifteen minutes passed, and Maggie showed up to help look.

An hour after Sadie disappeared, they moved from the park and started looking around the neighborhood, asking businesses and people on the street if they had seen Sadie.

An hour and a half, and they called the police.

A day, and Sadie’s picture started to appear on the news.

It was about then that Maggie realized that Sadie’s wizard book and magic wand were gone. Daniel said that she always carried them with her in her book bag, and he watched carefully to make sure she didn’t return it with her library books. It wasn’t in her book bag, and despite Daniel's insistence, they checked the library book return and didn't find it. No one who was searching for Sadie found them either.

“Well, they're like her security blanket by this point,” Maggie reasoned. “I hope she was able to hang on to them. They'll keep her calm until we find her.”

Three days, and the solar storms quieted suddenly, puzzling astronomers worldwide, but Maggie and Daniel hardly noticed except to be grateful that they could communicate more easily about the search and tracking down leads.

Bartholomeow paced the house restlessly, looking for Sadie, and meowing sadly when he couldn’t find her. It was heartbreaking to see him so concerned, especially since he had spent the first four-and-a-half years of Sadie's life entirely unimpressed by her.

A week, and no news. Sadie had vanished in a span of fifteen seconds, and there was absolutely no hint as to where she had gone.

Daniel blamed himself. How could he not? One minute, she was there. He turned his back to try and get a better signal, and when he turned back, she was gone. The park wasn’t crowded - it’s not like someone could have snatched her without him noticing. A five-year-old couldn’t have run very far without being seen, and he hadn't heard the sound of her footsteps, anyway. Unless he was just _that_ stupid and oblivious that he missed it entirely. So it was _obviously_ his fault.

Maggie didn’t see it that way, but nothing she said could assure Daniel that he wasn’t at fault. “We’ll find out the whole story when Sadie gets home,” she said, but she didn’t believe it.

Three weeks after Sadie vanished, the doorbell rang. There was an unfamiliar woman with a parakeet on her shoulder standing there.

Looking at her, Maggie just _knew._ “You have news about Sadie.” It wasn’t a question.

The woman nodded. “I’m afraid so.”

“Come in.”

“What happened?” Daniel asked, voice raspy.

The woman had a fierce, grim expression on her face. “Sadie stopped the stars from going out.”

Bartholomeow yowled.

**Author's Note:**

> This fic's been a year and a half in the making. I first got the idea from [a Tumblr post by astahfrith containing a nursery rhyme version of the Oath,](http://sunrisenebula.tumblr.com/post/52350963504/astahfrith-one-two-three-four-i-declare-an) but the idea never really got off the ground until I mentioned a (very) young wizard in _Only a Mere Florist_. 
> 
> Daniel's name is not an intentional Stargate reference, just coincidence. I've had a few people ask about it but Stargate is still on my to- watch list and I have not seen it yet. 
> 
> Many thanks to [fulldaysdrive](http://archiveofourown.org/users/fulldaysdrive/pseuds/fulldaysdrive) for beta-ing this for me.
> 
> goonlalagoon on tumblr made some stellar fanart [that can be found here!](http://goonlalagoon.tumblr.com/post/151574830860/fanart-for-the-beautifully-written-young-wizards)


End file.
